


You Put Your Hand Out and There Is a Tiger

by eleanorb



Category: Sherlock (TV)
Genre: Colonel Moran, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-16
Updated: 2012-02-16
Packaged: 2017-10-31 07:27:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,000
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/341503
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/eleanorb/pseuds/eleanorb
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Dr John Watson has an encounter in Afghanistan which may be significant later</p>
            </blockquote>





	You Put Your Hand Out and There Is a Tiger

It’s not a kidnapping, per se, more of a three line whip with a car thrown in and frankly John thinks it’s easier accede to Mycroft’s demands than to argue about it. At least the locations have improved; warehouses and creepy, darkened tea rooms have given way to proper offices with lights, receptions and doors. Of course Mycroft’s flair for the dramatic means that this particular office is housed in Tower Bridge and the leaded windows look out on to the Embankment where an attractive girl is reading Shakespeare from a book on her lap. But you can’t have everything.

He’s been there half an hour reading The Lady, which is full of adverts for nannies, must speak three languages, and Debs at hunt balls, when the main office door clicks open and an unexpectedly familiar woman carrying a slim black case, steps out and walks past without even looking in his direction  
________________________

Afghanistan

“You didn’t see that.” John’s startled as Ward Sister Watts pulls him away from the window. Behind him an unmarked helicopter barely touches down before a slim figure slips into the Foxhound patrol vehicle and it drives away.

“What do you mean?” It’s his first week here and his first on nights. So far it’s been both quieter and bloodier than he expected.

“The black helicopters, Special Ops. We don’t see them and we don’t talk about them. OK?” She holds his confused gaze until she’s sure he understands.

It clicks suddenly and John nods. “Right, fine. Shall we do a walk round then, make sure everyone is comfortable?”

Amiya Watts gathers up her thick black hair into a ponytail, secures it with a band and joins him on his way to the ward.

More than two hours later John’s finishing up the reports on his desk. It’s almost unnaturally quiet here. In the army you get shouting and waiting and mad adrenaline fuelled action but even the waiting’s loud; white noise of blood pumping, breath held before the trigger’s pulled. It’s not like that here. It’s a calm, seductive silence. He can see why some people fall in love with the country; it has a fairytale quality, an exoticism that creeps up on you unnoticed and traps you in its embrace before you’ve time to move.

Fifteen minutes later when he looks at the clock and stands up to stretch, a vehicle comes through the main gates flat out.

He’s expecting bodies and stretchers, a harsh call to action. What he gets is a dark haired man in a black suit supporting a woman in a chadri and abaya.

“I’ll call a nurse.” He says in English then repeats in Dari Persian, the local lingua franca. Local women use the clinic all the time; it’s often their only access to health care when their religion bans them from seeing male doctors.

“No.” The man in the suit shuts the door firmly and leans a black leather case against the wall. “Just you.”

“But...”

“No nurse.” The woman insists. “The fewer people who know we’re here the better.” Her accent is English, decidedly upper class and tinged with pain. She moves towards the bed trying to remove the chadri from her head, and failing.

The man in the suit coughs. “Anonymity, remember”

“Fuck that, “she swears. “ I want to get out of this bloody sweatbox of a tent!” As she moves again John hears a sharp intake of breath and another muffled profanity.

“Did they give you painkillers on the way here?” he asks.

She nods. “From the emergency kit”

“Need any more?

“No, not yet. Afterwards, perhaps, before they...before they fetch me.”

She finally manages to untangle herself from black cotton. Under the loose robes she’s wearing army issue trousers and a khaki tank top, ripped down one side and soaked in blood. Her short brown hair is flecked with grey and when she turns and blinks into the light John sees her eyes are the colour of cornflowers.

“Flesh wound, I think” she says as she finally sits down.

“It’s a bit more than that.” John says as he inspects the wound. ”There’s brick and glass in there.” He starts to clean the wound and the colour drains visibly out of her face. “Is this the only place you’re hurt?”

“Yes. They got a shot in before...”

“Colonel!” The warning comes from across the room.

“I apologise. “ It’s quiet and polite, as if she’s made some faux pas at Ascot, rather than almost compromised her mission.

“Lay down, on your right side. I’ll be as quick as I can”

“You have forty minutes, doctor.”

It takes him about thirty five. He spends the final few minutes jotting down the doses of painkillers and antibiotics he’s used. He gives the man the slip of paper. “Make sure the doctor at the other end gets this. It’s important.”

The man nods, picks up the case and before John can start to tidy up they’re in the helicopter and away.

Much later the next day he catches the news on the World Service.

“Chances for a settlement in Afghanistan seem closer today as the main opponent to talks, Sher Mohammad Sabhir, was assassinated, by what reports suggest was, a woman from within his own community.”

\---------------------------------------

Mycroft looks up and watches as John’s eyes track the woman down the corridor.

“You know her?” he doesn’t wait for a reply. “That’s, “he pauses “unfortunate.”

“I do know how to keep a secret.”

“Yes, I suppose you do and you have signed the Official Secrets Act. You do know there’s no time limit on that, don’t you?”

“Of course.”

“Good. There are some things we really prefer not to be in the public domain.”

John makes a small noise in agreement though he’s really not sure at this point who ‘we’ refers to. He can only hope it’s the British Government.

Mycroft continues, “The cold blooded murder of a respected London cab driver, for instance.”

“Absolutely.” John agrees.


End file.
